Still, Rep. James R. Santora, another Delaware County Republican, said even stalwart church supporters like him were finding themselves under attack and unhappy about it.

"I believe everyone that voted for the bill is being targeted," he said, including himself in that list but declining to say how he had been targeted.

To Santora, the naming of lawmakers inside churches and in parish bulletins smacked of "electioneering." He questioned the propriety of the church telling worshipers, as he saw it, that they were not worthy of votes come November.

It also bothered Santora that, to the church, it made no difference that he had helped secure millions of public dollars to help the archdiocese finance the visit of Pope Francis to Philadelphia. Or that his late mother worked for the archdiocese. Or that his children attend Catholic school.

"We're constantly advocating for the church," Santora said in an interview, "and now we're the enemy."

At Mass Saturday and Sunday at St. Dorothy's in Drexel Hill, the pastor did not name Santora, he said, but did read a letter from Chaput urging parishioners to contact the Senate Judiciary Committee.

After that, calls and emails began flowing in, including from a major church donor who asked Santora to explain why he had supported the bill.

Santora said he did so because as a Catholic he felt it was the moral thing to do.

"I had a choice," he said. "Do I choose victims, or do I choose the rapists or the abusers? I chose the victims."

In an interview Tuesday, Rep. Martina White of Northeast Philadelphia was visibly moved as she described hearing a few days ago she would be no longer welcome at some constituent events in her district. She said a priest told her aide the reason was White's support in April of House Bill 1947.

"When you think of the Catholic Church, you think of acceptance and forgiveness and a community that's available to you," said White, a first-term Republican who belongs to St. Christopher's in Somerton and attended 12 years of Catholic school.

"Being dis-invited," she said, choking back tears, "you feel cut off."

A letter on the issue distributed to St. Christopher's parishioners over the weekend didn't identify White, she said, but it did name Sen. John Sabatina, a Democrat from Northeast Philadelphia. (He did not respond to request for comment.)

Another legislator said to have been shaken after hearing his parish priest call him out by name at Mass was Rep. Thomas Murt of Montgomery County, according to Miccarelli, who said he discussed it with Murt. A Republican and Iraq war vet, Murt did not respond to a request seeking an interview.

In recent letters distributed to worshipers and through Catholic schools, Chaput and others have expressed many of the same concerns that, when brought to the table in Colorado, helped defeat a change to the civil statute of limitations there.

They say the bill is unconstitutional because it allows retroactive filing of civil claims; is selective because the retroactivity does not apply uniformly to public schools and state institutions; and could bankrupt schools and parishes by allowing a flood of lawsuits for clergy abuse.

Gavin also noted that the archdiocese had taken action in recent years to help victims of clergy abuse, dedicating more than $13 million since 2002 "to provide victim assistance to individuals and families, including counseling, providing medication, eliminating barriers to travel and childcare, and providing vocational assistance as well as other forms of support."

Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Stewart Greenleaf (R., Montgomery) has taken no position on the bill, committing only to hold a hearing Monday on its constitutionality.